Bounds o’er the glebe, to course the fearful hare,
She in her speed does all her safety lay;
And he with double speed pursues the prey;
O’erruns her at the sitting turn, and licks
His chaps in vain, and blows upon the flix:
She scapes, and for the neighb’ring covert strives,
And, gaining shelter, doubts if yet she lives.
If little things with great we may compare,
Such was the god, and such the flying fair;
She, urged by fear, her feet did swiftly move,
But he more swiftly, who was urged by love.
He gathers ground upon her in the chase;
Now breathes upon her hair, with nearer pace;
And just is fastening on the wish’d embrace.
The nymph grew pale, and, in a mortal fright,
Spent with the labour of so long a flight,
And now despairing, cast a mournful look
Upon the streams of her paternal brook:
“O help,” she cried, “in this extremest need!
If water-gods are deities indeed;
Gape earth, and this unhappy wretch entomb;
Or change my form, whence all my sorrows come.”
Scarce had she finish’d, when her feet she found
Benumb’d with cold, and fasten’d to the ground;
A filmy rind about her body grows;
Her hair to leaves, her arms extend to boughs:
The nymph is all into a laurel gone;
The smoothness of her skin remains alone.
Yet Phoebus loves her still, and casting round
Her bole his arms, some little warmth he found.
The tree still panted in the unfinish’d part,
Not wholly vegetive, and heaved her heart.
He fix’d his lips upon the trembling rind;
It swerved aside, and his embrace declined:
To whom the god, “Because thou canst not be
My mistress, I espouse thee for my tree:
Be thou the prize of honour and renown;
The deathless poet, and the poem, crown:
Thou shalt the Roman festivals adorn,
And, after poets, be by victors worn:
Thou shalt returning Caesar’s triumph grace,
When pomps shall in a long procession pass;
Wreath’d on the post before his palace wait,
And be the sacred guardian of the gate:
Secure from thunder, and unharm’d by Jove;
Unfading as the immortal powers above:
And as the locks of Phoebus are unshorn,
So shall perpetual green thy boughs adorn.”
The grateful tree was pleased with what he said,
And shook the shady honours of her head.
Transformation of Io Into a Heifer, and the Eyes of Argus Into a Peacock’s Train
Io, the daughter of Inachus, becomes the favourite mistress of Jupiter, who transforms her into the shape of a beautiful heifer, in order that she may escape the jealousy of Juno—The goddess, suspecting the fraud, obtains from her husband the animal, whose beauty she commends; and commits her to the custody of the hundred-eyed Argus—Mercury, at the command of Jupiter, destroys Argus, whose eyes are placed by Juno on the tail of the peacock, a bird sacred to her divinity; while Io, exposed to the persecutions of the enraged goddess and wandering over the greatest part of the earth, at length arrives in Egypt, where she is restored to her former shape, and worshipped as a deity under the name of Iris.
An ancient forest in Thessalia grows,
Which Tempe’s pleasing valley does enclose:
Through this the rapid Peneus takes his course,
From Pindus rolling with impetuous force:
Mists from the river’s mighty fall arise,
And deadly damps enclose the cloudy skies;
Perpetual fogs are hanging o’er the wood;
And sounds of waters deaf the neighbourhood.
Deep in a rocky cave he makes abode
(A mansion proper for a mourning god).
Here he gives audience; issuing out decrees
To rivers, his dependant deities.
On this occasion hither they resort,
To pay their homage, and to make their court;
All doubtful whether to congratulate
His daughter’s honour, or lament her fate.
Sperchaeus, crown’d with poplar, first appears;
Then old Apidanus came crown’d with years:
Enipeus turbulent; Amphrysos tame;
And Aeas last, with lagging waters came;
Then of his kindred brooks a numerous throng
Condole his loss, and bring their urns along:
Not one was wanting of the watery train
That fill’d his flood, or mingled with the main,
But, Inachus, who, in his cave alone,
Wept not another’s losses, but his own;
For his dear Io, whether stray’d or dead
To him uncertain, doubtful tears he shed.
He sought her through the world, but sought in vain,
And nowhere finding, rather fear’d her slain.
Her, just returning from her father’s brook,
Jove had beheld, with a desiring look:
“And, O fair daughter of the flood,” he said,
“Worthy alone of Jove’s imperial bed;
Happy whoever shall those charms possess;
The king of gods (nor is thy lover less)
Invites thee to yon cooler shades, to shun
The scorching rays of the meridian sun:
Nor shalt thou tempt the dangers of the grove
Alone, without a guide; thy guide is Jove:
No puny power, but he whose high command
Is unconfined, who rules the seas and land,
And tempers thunder in his awful hand.
O fly not:” for she fled from his embrace,
O’er Lerna’s pastures: he pursued the chase
Along the shades of the Lyrcaean plain.
At length the god, who never asks in vain,
Involved with vapours, imitating night,
Both air and earth; and then suppress’d her flight.
Meantime the jealous Juno, from on high,
Survey’d the fruitful fields of Arcady,
And wonder’d that the mist should overrun
The face of daylight, and obscure the sun.
No natural cause she found, from brooks, or bogs,
Or marshy lowlands, to produce the fogs:
Then round the skies she sought for Jupiter,
Her faithless husband; but no Jove was there.
Suspecting now the worst: “Or I,” she said,
“Am much mistaken, or am much betray’d.”
With fury she precipitates her flight;
Dispels the shadows of dissembled night,
And to the day restores his native light.
The almighty culprit, careful to prevent
The consequence, foreseeing her descent,
Transforms his mistress in a trice; and now
In Io’s place appears a lovely cow.
So sleek her skin, so faultless was her make,
Ev’n Juno did unwilling pleasure take
To see so fair a rival of her love;
And what she was, and whence, inquired of Jove;
Of what fair herd, and from what pedigree?
The god, half caught, was forced upon a lie,
And said she sprung from earth. She took the word,
And begg’d the beauteous heifer of her lord.
What should he do? ’twas equal shame to Jove
Or to relinquish or betray his love;
Yet to refuse so slight a gift would be
But more to increase his consort’s jealousy:
Thus fear and love, by turns, his heart assail’d;
And stronger love had
